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The world's northernmost alternative newspaper
Vol. 7, Issue 12
www.icepeople.net
March 31, 2015
Patrolling the Pole
Russia scraps Barneo ice camp,
builds separate support sites for
military and science expeditions
By MARK SABBATINI
Editor
They've hosted barbers, figure skaters,
marathon runners and thousands of others seeking unique thrills at the top of the world, but
Russia is making it more clear than ever this
year their North Pole ambitions go way beyond
fun and games.
The country is abandoning the Bareno ice
camp it has operated on the sea ice at about 89
degrees latitude north for a few weeks every
April during the past 14 years in favor of two
longer-range bases that will emphasize military
and science projects instead of tourist expeditions, according to the Expeditionary Center of
the Russian Geographical Society.
Tourist expeditions, which generally in-
EXPEDITIONARY CENTER OF THE RUSSIAN GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY
Russian paratroopers, left, descend onto the sea ice at about 89 degrees and 47 minutes north
latitude Monday to construct a support camp for North Pole expeditions. At right,, workers inspect
fuel drums that will be dropped, along with other equipment, by parachute onto the ice camp.
volve a "last-degree" ski trip of about 60 kilometers to the North Pole, will continue this year
– and the leader of one major company said
Monday he's received no notice of any changes
in Russia's hosting plans – but "this year the
base will operate primarily for scientists," a
statement by the geographical society notes.
There are no plans to cancel the Barneo
project permanently, according to the agency.
"Next year it will continue its existence
with all interested operators, but this season our
See SUPPORT, page 4
Comedown after contact high
Lance struggling to return 'home'
after successful hookup with
space case in compatibility test
NASA / OPERATION ICEBRIDGE
The Lance is photographed by a C-130 plane during NASA's Operation IceBridge flight March 19.
Devastating diet
Bears wipe out
bird flocks as
ice vanishes
Page 2
Pitying the polar bear
Questions
about attacked
campers linger
Page 3
By MARK SABBATINI
Editor
As scientists, they're probably aware of
how achieving a contact high can be followed
by the letdown of being left out in the cold.
The Lance research vessel achieved a literal high point of its nearly three-month-old mission in the sea ice north of Svalbard by coordinating a simultaneous check of conditions with
a flyover conducted by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
The rendezvous will provide researchers
with additional supporting data for their respective studies.
"It was about a year of 'I know that you’re
out there, I'm going to ask you on a date, I
promise I’m going to ask you,'" said Jackie
See HOOKUP, page 3
Rip-roaring revs
What makes a
fox crazy? Too
much gas
Page 4
Spying for science
Norway,
Russia join for
work in wild
icepeople.net
March 31, 2015
Page 2
Who's to blame and how
to express your wrath
'No chicks or eggs of any species…survived'
Editor
Mark Sabbatini
Principal of principles
Kristan Hutchison
Psychiatrist
Irene Gallion
Accomplice
Jeff Newsom
Mailing address
Icepeople
Vei 210 -2- 13
Longyearbyen, Svalbard
9170
Norway
Telephone
Norway: +47 41 51 46 38
U.S. +1 (970) 673-4472
E-mail
[email protected]
Web site
www.icepeople.net
Icepeople is published weekly (or thereabouts)
on Tuesdays (or thereabouts), with printed
copies available free on a limited basis in
Longyearbyen. Additional printed copies are
available locally and by mail upon request.
Charges are on an "at cost" basis.
Copyright stuff
Original contents of this publication can be
reproduced for non-commercial purposes free
of charge if Icepeople is credited as the
source. The original writers, photographers
and other contributors retain their rights to all
published works.
Corrections policy
When we screw up you'll know about it – on
the front page. One of the big complaints
about newspapers is they tend to bury
corrections and clarifications deep inside
where few people who read the original article
see them. If we need to fix something, an alert
box on the front page will state what story is in
error and where the full correction is printed.
Submitting material
Letters, columns, photos and other material
are welcome, but we can't offer pay for
published items since nobody here is getting
paid at the moment. Submissions in electronic
form (text, Word documents, JPEGs, etc.) are
highly preferred, although typing and/or
scanning of items will be considered on a percase basis. We reserve the right to edit
submissions for length, clarity, accuracy, libel
and other reasons, but we will also make
every reasonable effort to contact the author
about any changes prior to publication.
JOUKE PROP / UNIVERSITY OF GRONINGEN
A polar bear raids the nesting grounds of barnacle geese at Nordenskiöldkysten, an increasingly
common way for bears to seek food during the past decade as climate change has dissolved
much of the sea ice they traditional hunt seals from. "We had the first polar bear predation (there)
in 2004,” said Jouke Prop, an ornithologist from the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, a
principal author of a new study analyzing the bears' feeding habits in Svalbard and Greenland. “In
most of the years since, predation has been really severe.” He told Science magazine he has
observed polar bears at Nordenskiöldkysten eating more than 200 eggs in two hours, and last
year no chicks or eggs of any species—barnacle geese, eiders, and glaucous gulls—survived.
The study, published in Frontier in Ecology and Evolution, is available at tinyurl.com/olg9du5.
Icesheet
Random bits of the week's weirdness:
This week's episode of Arctic Cold War
Chronicles is titled "it's good Russia is bad,"
which is the theme of an Aftenposten feature
about Longyearbyen that begins with the locals
declaring "Putin is our best friend." That's
the simplified answer to the article's question of "can Russian saber rattling in northern regions contribute to saving Svalbard's
cornerstone business?" It's not a huge surprise local politicians and coal miners suspect
the Norwegian government will give Store
Norske a desperately needed bailout loan to ensure the country maintains a strong presence
here, since Russia is openly doing the same
thing by propping up its fledgling operations in
Barentsburg and Pyramiden. That doesn't mean
officials on the mainland are entirely happy
about it - the article quotes Jakub Godzimirski,
a Russia expert with the Norwegian Institute of
International Affairs, as saying Svalbard is
Norway's "Achilles heel" in that "coal is not
something that we need, (but) it is important to
have a Norwegian settlement in Svalbard to
show that we have something to do purely for
practical reasons." … Of course, an NRK article
JOSHUA HOLKO / FACEBOOK
No mercy: Locals watched this bear as a cub,
only to see him and his sister killed as youths.
STORE NORSKE
The latest anti-spy technology: An obscuring
substance known as "snow" does wonders to
keep foes from using our coal mine webcam.
reminds us Parliament hasn't actually approved
the loan yet and, while it is scheduled to decide
in April, Store Norske is facing almost immediate bankruptcy if something goes awry. Which
is why one of the more interesting corporate
press releases this week came from AF Gruppen, which announced a new 250-millionkroner contract to continue providing logistical services to Store Norske until September 2018. That isn't leaving the subcontractor
feeling flush, since "significant cost savings"
are part of the terms, but obviously higher-up
corporate folks aren't expecting any major surprises from politicos … Finally, while the investigation into the March 19 polar bear attack
on a group of campers is pending, it's safe to
say there's a near-unanimous verdict favoring the animal in the local court of public
opinion. The bear, seen in widely published
photos last winter with its mother and a sibling,
was again captured on film repeatedly shortly
before the attack, resulting in scathing social
media comments such as the campers "being so
stupid and arrogant" in picking their campsite.
Page 3
March 31, 2015
HEADLINES STOLEN FROM
SVALBARDPOSTEN
VERDENS NORDLIGSTE AVIS
Questions about campers
linger after polar bear attack
GUNNAR SPREEN / NORWEGIAN POLAR INSTITUTE
Researchers from the Lance campaign prepare a survey field on an ice floe for NASA's Operation
IceBridge's overflight by marking it with plastic bags and orange poles to resemble a runway.
Lance, NASA compare vital stats
HOOKUP, from page 1
Richter-Menge, co-leader of NASA's Operation IceBridge project, in a press release issued
by the agency. "Then the time for the date
comes and it becomes more of a rapid-fire, detailed conversation."
First, of course, they have to meet each
other, which turned out to be something of a
challenge resembling a blind date.
"We were probably about one minute –
four miles – away from the ship when we spotted it, and we had a little time to react to it,"
said John Sonntag, IceBridge’s field team leader. "But the survey line near the ship, which
was our real target, was much harder to see
than the ship itself. The Norwegian field team
did a huge amount of labor to set it up, to make
it look for the pilots a bit like a runway, but
still, from 1,500 feet up and two to three nautical miles away, that was very hard to see."
IceBridge is NASA’s biannual airborne
survey of polar sea and land ice, and its March
19 flight that passed above the northeast coast
of Greenland before reaching the Lance was
the inaugural flight of this year's project.
The Lance is at the midpoint of a planned
six-month expedition where the Norwegian
Polar Institute vessel is frozen into the sea ice
studying its progress "from cradle to grave" in
order to develop more accurate monitoring and
prediction methods. Scientists from 10 countries
are participating in what is being hailed as one
of the institute's most ambitious projects ever.
The ship and crew have encountered several difficulties since departing Longyearbyen
on Jan. 11, including being pushed out of the
ice when the vessel drifted too far south. But
with the ship now trying to return to Longyearbyen during Easter for a crew change, participants are discovering "getting out of the ice
will not be easy," according to the project's official blog (tinyurl.com/p84frrc).
"Due to wind conditions, the ice is compact, and progress is rather slow, but with
some skill and patience she will eventually
make it out all right," wrote Harald Steen, the
expedition's leader.
In addition to a new crew and group of
scientists, an exchange of equipment will occur
since some is in need of repair while new instruments are needed for different types of data
collection scheduled to take place during the
second half of the expedition.
"The upcoming legs will also see an increased effort on studying the effect of solar
radiation and the fate of the ecosystem, using
remotely operated vehicles (ROVs), drones,
divers and airplanes," Steen wrote.
Turbulent weather during the days before
the NASA flyover allowed the departing scientists to spot new cracks in floes followed by new
ice development that showed an "enormous
impact on the energy balance and the biogeochemistry of our surroundings," he noted.
There's more! Visit www.icepeople.net
for the complete story.
Numerous questions remain unanswered
about a March 19 polar bear attack at a campsite that injured one man, especially regarding
the group's preparedness and actions after the
attack, but The Governor of Svalbard said investigators are unlikely to finish their work
until after Easter. A tripwire alarm system
failed to work properly, there was nobody
standing guard when the bear attacked at
about 5:30 a.m. and the group didn't notify the
governor's office about the encounter until 50
minutes after it occurred. The two-year-old
bear, observed and photographed by several
people during the days before the attack, was
described as healthy and unlikely to invade a
campsite out of desperation for food.
Injured snowmobiler found
unconscious in riverbed
A man seriously injured in a snowmobile
accident Sunday night at Diabasodden is in
stable condition at University Hospital of
North Norway in Tromsø, according to officials. "We found him down in the riverbed, or
a wind hole," said Christian Svarstad, a police
chief lieutenant for The Governor of Svalbard.
"He was not conscious, but he was breathing
and had a pulse." The man was driving in the
area alone and friends notified the governor's
office when he failed to return by 11 p.m. He
was discovered during a helicopter search at
1:22 a.m. Conditions were described as about
minus 10 degrees Celsius with strong winds,
but the spot he was found at was somewhat
sheltered from the elements. Details of his
specific injuries were not released.
Man hospitalized after falling
10 meters from climbing wall
A man in his 30s who fell about 10 meters
from the climbing wall inside Svalbardhallen
on Friday night was flown to University Hospital of North Norway in Tromsø, according
to The Governor of Svalbard. The cause of the
incident remains under investigation, but it
appears proper climbing gear was used and
friction from a rope apparently slowed the rate
of the man's fall, said Ståle Nylund, a police
chief lieutenant for the governor.
Weather forecast for Longyearbyen
Wednesday
Partly cloudy. SW winds to 39
km/h. High -7C (-13C wind
chill), low -11C (-17C wind
chill).
Sunrise: 5:09a, sunset: 8:52p
Thursday
Partly cloudy. S winds to 39
km/h. High -11C (-18C wind
chill), low -13C (-19C wind
chill).
Sunrise: 5:00a, sunset: 9:00p
Friday
Partly cloudy. SW winds to 32
km/h. High -14C (-18C wind
chill), low -14C (-20C wind
chill).
Sunrise: 4:52a, sunset: 9:09p
Saturday
Partly cloudy. NW winds to 25
km/h. High -13C (-18C wind
chill), low -15C (-21C wind
chill).
Sunrise: 4:42a, sunset: 9:17p
Extended forecast: Sunday, p. cloudy, -4C (-10C), -14C (-19C), light 16:53h; Monday, snow, 0C (-7C), -3C (-10C), light 17:11h;
Tuesday, rain/snow, 0C (-4C), -3C (-6C), light 17:30h; Wednesday, cloudy, -3C (-7C), -12C (-19C), light 17:50h
Data provided by storm.no
March 31, 2015
Page 4
What's up
April 1
6 p.m.: Movie: "Annie," U.S. drama/
musical, all ages. Kulturhuset.
April 6
5 p.m.: Movie: "Asterix: Le Domaine Des
Dieux" (3D), French animated, all ages.
Kulturhuset.
7 p.m.: Movie: "Fast and Furious 7," U.S.
action/thriller, ages 11 and up.
Kulturhuset.
April 8
6 p.m.: Movie: "Asterix: Le Domaine Des
Dieux," French animated, all ages.
Kulturhuset.
April 10
JON AARS / NORWEGIAN POLAR INSTITUTE
A trio of snowmobiles is observed by researchers attempting to determine the impact of traffic on
Arctic foxes. The study found snowmobiles alter the animals' behavior, but not survival rates.
Why is a fox crazy? Engines
Study: Heavy snowmobile traffic
alters behavior of animals, but
not breeding or survival rates
By MARK SABBATINI
Editor
A large group of snowmobilers probably
won't be shocked to see all those engines affecting the behavior of nearby wildlife. But a
new study suggests the ruckus is more of a
nuisance than existential threat for at least one
group of animals.
Researchers who set up 20 cameras that
took pictures of snowmobiles every five min-
utes in two areas of Nordenskiöld Land – one
with heavy traffic, one with light – discovered
"both changed behavior and limited activity"
of Arctic foxes in the busier area, according to
the Norwegian Polar Institute study published
last week (tinyurl.com/os7ypxy).
However, "the study documents no correlation between Arctic fox reproduction and
survival in relation to current traffic levels." At
the same time, the researchers noted other factors such as climate change and pollution may
make snowmobile traffic more of a threat in
the future.
There's more! Visit www.icepeople.net
for the complete story.
Russia bailing on Barneo – sort of
SUPPORT, from page 1
team has another mission," the statement notes.
Eric Philps, owner of Icetrek and president
of the International Polar Guides Association,
said he's approaching this season the same as
the previous 12 years he's led expeditions –
even referring to the ice camp as "Barneo" –
since he'd "likely be among the first to know"
if Russia was drastically altering its support for
tourist expeditions.
"The season, from my perspective of the
tourists and skiers, is that nothing has
changed," he said.
Victor Boyarsky of Vicaar International
Projects and Expeditions, a logistics company
based in Moscow, told Explorersweb, "if everything goes as planned, we expect to have
the first commercial flight with skiers from
Longyearbyen, Svalbard, on April 3. This year
Barneo camp will be closed on April 25."
North Pole expeditions departing from
Longyearbyen to Barneo typically occur during
the first three weeks of April, although weather
and sea ice conditions often alter the timing by
several days at both ends of the calendar.
A floating science station, named "North
Pole-2015" is scheduled to remain in operation
for up to six months beginning in April. A series of military exercises, known as "Victory
2015," will be conducted at another site in observation of the 70th anniversary of the victory
in WWII and the 85th anniversary of Russia’s
Airborne Forces.
A post Monday on the society's Facebook
page states that, after several days of searching
for a suitable place to construct an ice runway
for the science base, equipment and paratroopers were dropped onto a site at about 89 degrees and 47 minutes north latitude and 48 degrees and 35 minutes east longitude.
Russia has maintained an aggressive posture about "owning" the North Pole, including
numerous high-profile acts such as planting a
flag on the seabed there in 2007 (a nuclear submarine planted another flag last summer) and
annual consecration services by religious leaders to symbolize the country's efforts toward
"the return of the country’s former position in
the region." Canada and Denmark have recently joined the territorial dispute by filing continental shelf claims under the United Nations
Convention on the Law of the Sea.
There's more! Visit www.icepeople.net
for the complete story.
Camp Svalbard winter session for youths
13-16. Registration and more details at
[email protected].
April 12
5 p.m.: Movie: "The Second Best Exotic
Marigold Hotel," U.S. comedy, all ages.
Kulturhuset.
7:30 p.m.: Movie: "The Gunman,"
Spanish/French/British action/thriller,
ages 15 and up. Kulturhuset.
April 13
8 p.m.: Trivia quiz. Barentz Pub.
April 15
6 p.m.: Movie: "The Gunman."
Kulturhuset.
April 19
9 p.m.: Movie: "Chappie," U.S. comedy/
sci-fi, ages 15 and up. Kulturhuset.
April 20
8 p.m.: Trivia quiz. Barentz Pub.
April 22
6 p.m.: Movie: "Avengers: Age of
Ultron" (3D), U.S. action/fantasy, no age
limit specified. Kulturhuset.
April 26
5 p.m.: Movie: "The DUFF," U.S.
romance/comedy, all ages. Kulturhuset.
7 p.m.: Movie: "Pride," British comedy/
drama, ages 7 and up. Kulturhuset.
What's online
Icepeople.net provides daily updates of
news about Svalbard and the world's
polar regions, plus extras for articles from
the print edition. Among the latest news:
● Antarctica reaches 63°F in heat wave
● U.K. greenhouse gas down 8.4% in '14
● Japan's whalers strike out in Antarctica
● New 'Sibirosaurus' dinosaur discovered